1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to computer systems, and in particular to sharing data between computer systems. Still more particularly, the present invention relates to sharing data between computer systems with incompatible operating systems (OS).
2. Description of the Related Art
Operation of computer systems requires an operating system (OS). There are presently several different OSes available on the market. Each OSes provided unique features, and consequently, it is very common for the OSes to be incompatible with each other. Customers typically chose one of the available OSes to run their computer system(s).
Occasionally, these customers may decide to change their current operating system platform to another operating system platform. Typically, when changing operating system platforms, the customers desire to migrate their print and file services. The migration of print and file services from one operating system platform to another is fairly simple and straight forward for small deployments (single computers or small network of computers). With smaller systems, the migration process can be completed very quickly, causing little delay in allowing the users to access the new operating system platform and sign in to interact with the services provided.
With larger distributed systems (e.g., systems with multiple domain controllers), however, the migration process becomes very complicated and may take significantly longer (perhaps months) to be completed. More specifically, the logistics of keeping the user data in synch across multiple domains during the migration becomes extremely difficult.
The domain controllers usually provide the authentication features for users who desire to access the services provided by a particular platform. Shutting down user access to the domain controllers of the old platform while the new platform is being made ready for user access is typically not an attractive option. With the conventional method, the users are shut out and cannot update their password or other user data while the migration process is being undertaken. There is therefore a need to enable migration across different operating system platforms to occur in a relatively seamless manner from the user's perspective.